Friday, February 15, 2013

The Face of Evil

Dear Gary—
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?”
The Doctor’s own voice, echoing, repeating, reverberating. The Doctor’s own face, larger than life and multiplied before him.
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?”
Circling around him in a symphony of insanity.
The Face of Evil.
The Mandragora Helix in the Masque of Mandragora let the Doctor off the hook. The Face of Evil does not. The Face of Evil confronts the Doctor with huge depictions of himself in various forms—cut in rock, floating projections, images on a screen—giant, accusatory faces. The Doctor has been here before.
“I must have made quite an impression.”
When the Doctor first emerges from the TARDIS with, “I think this is not Hyde Park,” (“Could be a nexial discontinuity.”) he is alone. Sarah Jane has been left behind, as has Gallifrey. Companionless, the Doctor begins talking to the camera, which I find rather jarring (although not unprecedented—William Hartnell wishing the audience a Merry Christmas during The Feast of Steven). Almost immediately, however, he meets up with Leela, and the hints start piling up that he has been here before.
“The Evil One,” Leela exclaims upon first meeting the Doctor.
“Well, nobody’s perfect, but that’s overstating it a little,” the Doctor replies and offers her a Jelly Baby, to which Leela retorts, “They say the Evil One eats babies.”
The Evil One, The Face of Evil. The Doctor is not going to be let off the hook on this one.
The Doctor starts putting the clues together when he encounters the Sevateem, a primitive tribe from which Leela has been expelled for heresy. Their ritual hand motions, the Doctor realizes, are the gestures used when checking the seams on a Starfall Seven spacesuit, and their holy relics are relics from a long lost space mission. “The whole place is littered with their equipment, their weapons and tools,” the Doctor explains. These Sevateem are not what they seem.
Eventually the Doctor pieces together that the Sevateem are descendents of the Mordee Expedition, and he recalls having helped this expedition by repairing their computer.
The Doctor has long held computers in disdain, and he has had several run-ins with computers gone amok (WOTAN and BOSS among the more memorable). Now he has Xoanon to contend with. Xoanon, made in his own image. Xoanon, worshiped as a god. Xoanon, schizophrenic engineer of a eugenics experiment gone awry. Xoanon.
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?”
The Doctor is not being let off this hook. The Doctor is the cause of this mess. The Doctor is the creator of this world (a world, curiously enough, with only one Eve).
“Gods don’t use transceivers.” The Doctor must put this mess right, and he begins by cutting through the ceremonial trappings of superstition and stating facts.
This is where Leela is so brilliantly conceived.
Leela has grown up with this ceremony. Leela has been instilled with this superstition. But Leela has an open and curious mind. Leela rejects the ceremony. Leela rejects the superstition. Leela is just waiting for the Doctor to arrive to fill in the answers for her. Or more accurately, to guide her to seek her own answers.
Leela: “Do you know the answer to everything?”
Doctor: “Yes. Well, no, no. Answers are easy. It’s asking the right questions which is hard.”
But the right questions often lead to uncertainty:
Leela: “I don’t know what to believe any more.”
Doctor: “Well, that sounds healthy, anyway, Leela. Never be certain of anything. It’s a sign of weakness.”
Being certain is what has weakened the Sevateem and the Tesh. The Sevateem—the survey team of the original Mordee Expedition, gone out to explore the planet surface. The Tesh—the technicians of the original Mordee Expedition, left behind in the rocket. Divided by a barrier created by Xoanon, the Sevateem have developed in body while the Tesh have developed in mind. And each, the Sevateem and the Tesh, is certain in their beliefs. Certain in their myths. Certain in their superstitions. And each, the Sevateem and the Tesh, is weak.
I find it interesting, Gary, that the Sevateem—the tribe of the body, the tribe of brute strength, the tribe of survival instinct—has produced more rebels, has produced more flexibility of thought, has produced more open minds. The Tesh, on the other hand, the think tank of Mordee, is rigid and intractable.
It is easy to look at Leela and Tomas and Calib of the Sevateem to prove the point, but let’s look to Neeva vs. the Tesh Jabel. These are the two true believers. The two spiritual leaders. Let us look to them.
Neeva: “The gates of Paradise shall be opened to the people of Xoanon and his dwelling place revealed.”
The ancient litany is coming true.
Tomas: “We’ve outgrown the old superstitions, Neeva.” Tomas has never believed—he has always been a doubting Tomas—but he was more coward than rebel and never voiced his doubts to the tribe as his friend Leela had.
Neeva: “But it is there, isn’t it Tomas?”
The ancient litany IS coming true.
Neeva (continuing): “We start getting proof and we stop believing.”
The ancient litany is coming true. It is right there, isn’t it? Right there before them. Xoanon’s dwelling place revealed just as the litany spoke. The proof of the litany is before them. Stop believing just when the litany is coming true?
Tomas: “With proof, we don’t have to believe.” Doubting Tomas never believed, but he now has the proof before him and no longer needs any ancient litany to tell him what he can see in front of him.
But it is not the proof of the litany that shakes Neeva’s faith. That started with the Doctor. The image of the Evil One with the voice of his god. The litany was true—the proof is before them. It is Xoanon who was false.
“I underestimated that man,” the Doctor says when Neeva acknowledges that it is the Doctor and not Xoanon speaking to him through the holy relic. The Doctor has been laying bare Xoanon’s lies since his arrival. It is the Doctor who has revealed Xoanon’s dwelling place. Xoanon has betrayed them. Xoanon has betrayed Neeva. The Doctor has cut through the ceremonial trappings of superstition and stated the facts. Confronted with these facts, with the proof, Neeva understands the true nature and betrayal of Xoanon.
Now let’s look at Jabel.
“Welcome Lord,” Jabel says upon meeting the Doctor. The Doctor has the face, not of the Evil One, but of Jabel’s god, the face of Xoanon.
“I do you honor, Lord of Time. We’ve waited long for your return,” Jabel intones as he kneels before the Doctor.
Here is his god personified: “You and he are as one. You will show us the way.”
But when the Doctor contradicts Jabel’s litany: “You are not the Lord of Time come again to save us!”
Concentrating on building strength of body, the Sevateem are able to accept truths outside of their belief system. Concentrating on building power of mind, the Tesh are not.
Doctor: “The very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common: they don’t alter their views to fit the facts, they alter the facts to fit their views, which can be uncomfortable if you happen to be one of the facts that need altering.”
The Sevateem have altered their views. The Tesh have not. The Doctor is a fact that needs altering. (Interesting parallel to the Time Lords in The Deadly Assassin who saw the need for fact altering, but that is another line of thought that hasn’t room at the present.)
But it is not the Sevateem and it is not the Tesh that the Doctor needs to confront. It is himself. It is Xoanon. Xoanon is he and he is Xoanon. “You and he are as one. You will show us the way.” Jabel was right in that.
The Doctor had been there before. He had fixed the Mordee Expedition computer.  “And I thought I was helping them,” he says.  “I misunderstood what Xoanon was,” he adds. Xoanon is not a mere computer; it is “a machine that’s become a living creature.” A living creature with the Doctor’s personality print in the data core, resulting in a split personality—the Doctor’s and its own.
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?”
A question repeated over and over, echoing and reverberating and circling endlessly.
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?”
“And I thought I was helping them.” Or did he?
“Or did I really forget? I forget if I forgot.”
Did the Doctor forget to wipe his personality from the data core?
“It may have been my own egotism.”
The Doctor is not letting himself off the hook on this one.
 “Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?” The endless question. And the answer? “We are Xoanon.” Except: “And I am the Doctor.” “No!” “I’m the Doctor.” “No!” “I am the Doctor.” “No! No! No! No! No!”
“Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?”
A living, sentient, computer being with a split personality.
Doctor: “Is that clear?”
Leela: “No.”
Doctor: “Well, come on then.”
Wiping his personality from the data core, the Doctor restores sanity to Xoanon the god/fiend and the dual personalities of the planet, Sevateem and Tesh, come together as one.
Well, it’s not quite as simple as that. At odds for so long with drastically different world views, these two tribes are not ready to mix and mingle just yet. Bickering over who is to be leader, the Doctor ducks out on these two newly reconciled factions of the same lineage, and Leela ducks out with him.
Leela: “Take me with you.”
Doctor: “Why?”
Leela: “What? Well, you like me, don’t you?”
Doctor: “Well, yes, I suppose I do like you. But then I like lots of people and I can’t go carting them around the universe with me.”
Dodging past the Doctor and into the TARDIS, we hear, “Don’t touch that! Don’t touch . . .” as the TARDIS dematerializes.
The Doctor has a new companion.
The Face of Evil is a richly layered story, Gary; one that I have grown to appreciate more with each viewing. And a perfect introduction to Leela. I was sorry to see Sarah Jane depart, but Leela is a worthy successor.
Who am I? A question that echoes through the universe. An answer for which many of us search in vain. Who am I?
I hope, Gary, that you have found your answer . . .

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